Humidity

Experiments With Humidity and Foil Card Curling

Since this is long, I'm going to put the most important result for players right here at the top:

Foil Magic cards, specifically the ones made in Texas, lie flat at 60% humidity at room temperature. If you have dry curled foils from sets like Commander Legends, or the Secret Lair series, 6-8 hours in a room with 60% humidity will flatten them. Dry air will curl them again in the same amount of time. This can be slowed by double sleeving, or stopped by storing them in an airtight container.

For those of you interested in the experiments read on!

Ok, for starters, this project is basically COVID's fault. Being stuck in the house for months at a time had me looking for ways to entertain myself. Card curling was trending again, and I realized that I'm in a pretty ideal situation for actually experimenting with cards to see what really happens. I have a bunch of cards, and a house that is dry upstairs, and humid in the basement. To get more control, I also picked up a humidistat controlled humidifier, and a temperature/humidity gauge with remote sensor.

The basics: Magic foil cards have a plastic layer on top of a paper layer. When the paper layer gets more humid, it expands, and when it gets dry, it contracts. So with the foil side up, a humid environment will curve a card like this: U and a dry environment like this: ∩

I posted my very first tinkering earlier, and I'll just quickly review that here.

I have four cards from Commander Legends. They came out of the pack flat, and after a week in 25-30% humidity, three of them curled. The fourth is the new 'etched' foil process.

CL 25% humidity https://photos.app.goo.gl/qYJVEceXEQ8a5LvM7

I exposed them to a very humid environment by putting them on a shelf in the bathroom, and running a hot shower every couple of hours for about 6 hours, and they flattened right out. Etched foil unchanged.

CL high humidity https://photos.app.goo.gl/HkHvx5L8nf6QWQqT6

I left one normal and the etched card alone, put one in a normal sleeve, and one double sleeved.

CL sleeved 25% humidity three days https://photos.app.goo.gl/3xyGzd3aGHetJyz67

CL sleeved 25% humidity five days https://photos.app.goo.gl/2kE3NoiJxuJmRAM29

Double sleeving slows the curling the most. Etched card remained flat throughout.

For the next experiment I set up the humidifier in the guest room, and set out dry curled cards from Commander Legends. I set the room at 45% humidity, and left them there

I was tired of "Your fingerprint wasn't recognized. Please try again."

Registered after washing my hands, after sports training/practice, on a humid day, etc. and my devices' fingerprint sensors haven't failed me since.

Hello, I was planning a solo trip to Japan sometime in 2022 for 2 or 3 weeks most likely either in the summer or winter, but I’m not sure which weather conditions are better? I would ideally like to go in the fall, but I’ll probably be busy attending university during that time, since we usually have a fall semester from last week of August to a week before Christmas in December, and then a spring semester from end of January to end of May. So, realistically I only have a break from June to August and January to be able to visit.

My focus is on summer, but I heard the humidity is pretty bad. I’ve grown up and I’m used to living in the low deserts. Summers where I live, get up to 120 F (48 C) or even up to 128 F (53 C) every year, but I’ve only ever experienced dry heat, and it’s really rare for it to become humid. So, I’m not exactly sure how bad the humidity is? Since I’ve never really experienced it before. What should I wear as a female? Or what should I bring to prepare myself just in case I choose to go in summer?

Usually dry heat where I live is just scorching pain, so it’s more advised to wear long sleeves or long pants over shorts from my experience to avoid getting burned or staying indoors for the most part, since it’s easy to get dehydrated.

If I were to go in the winter, having grown up in a desert, I’ve never seen snow, and the coldest it’s ever gotten was around 50 F (10 C), so this might not seem as cold to those who grew up around Snow, but this is pretty chilly to me lol I’m also worried about typhoons, because I’ve never experienced them before, so I’m not too sure what to do in those situations. I’m not too sure on what to wear around snow if I do go in winter?

Some itineraries on my trip involve a lot walking: (not in order) (is this doable to walk around outside in summer or winter? I’m also going to use a JR Pass)

• Hiking either on Mount Takao or Mount Koya
• Hiking up Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto
• Hiking the Kurama-dera Mountain Temple Trail
• The Arashiyama forest and the surrounding shrines and temples around there like the Otagi Nenbutsu-ji Temple, Kimono Forest, etc. (a day hike)
• visiting other temples and shrines
• Tokyo Disneysea or Disneyland
• Universal Studios Japan in Osaka
• An aquarium and Ferris wheel in Kyoto or Osaka
• Tama zoo (saw that it was pretty big, didn’t want to support small zoos like Ueno Zoo)
• Gardens like Imperial East Gardens and Meijiro Garden
• Using the “Osaka Amazing Pass” to visit attracti

.

So winter time makes me breathe fine (or closer to fine I think). Anyone else notice this? Maybe its the lower humidity. All the resources I find say that cold air worses asthma.

Ex Floridian here. Central AC is super common where I'm from and it de-humidifies as it runs. I got no issue getting rid of mold when I see it pop up along my windows, but I'd like to prevent it in the first place.

We and many places don't have AC units in this area. I can keep my windows open, but we're in rainy season. Right now, I'm airing out our suite on good days. I open windows and run the wall heater in the bathroom during/after shower.

I'd like to know what you homegrown Humboldt folks do to prevent mold. What dehumidifiers do you purchase? What are your magical methods?

Thank you in advance!

Hey guys, I have had an Asus strix gtx 1080 for a few years now and I never change the thermal paste. Today I opened it up to change thermal paste and I found some humidity in some components. Is this normal and should I do something about it?

Pics: https://imgur.com/a/SGkZTBm

Edit: Main reason I decided to change the thermal paste was because I was getting artifacts when playing some games, you think this could be the cause?

I'm a full-time modern day inventor, tinkerer, engineer and experimenter. I decided to retire from my company at age 25 and live off retirement funds from my IRA until they run low and I need to get a job again.

The plan is anything but simple, but the start is basically that I plan to calculate the area that my greenhouse will cover and ensure I have at least 3 times that in tiered garden beds to effectively triple my farmland. I'll start out small and make tools and automated motors to drag 3D printed planter, plow, and other arms across my greenhouses. I plan on setting up a command center in my house that will have sensor readings for soil temperature, light, moisture, and humidity.

I'll hand-pollinate and try to raise and keep a colony of honeybees that I will both use to make honey to sell and to pollinate crops eventually. I'll setup a series of solar panels for batteries to be charged with and use as much renewable energy as possible for charging electronics.

I hope to learn how to become a smith, a sawmill, and a carpenter to eventually build a small town.

I'm currently researching biofuels, new ways of generating power and harvesting energy. I'd love to test out any new or experimental research on the farm and I'd really love for researchers to come out and monitor their research and see the impact of their studies in the real world.

If you have any ideas, prototypes, problems, solutions, or discussions around what you think this farm can become, I'd love to hear it. So far I need help with 3D modeling, printing, smithing, insulating a home, making new types of clothes, art, design, finding sources of revenue, investigating legality of what I'm doing, taxes, solar panels, generators, smelting, metal casting, epoxy resin work, building green houses, robotics, AI, software developing, crowdsourcing, and practically every industry ever done.

I need help with this (a lot of help) and I plan on documenting it all on my twitch account, youtube, instagram, and in Discord.

My business name is Mini Market Makers and you'll find my twitch from my username here. I am really looking forward to this experience/experiment, and I'd really love to meet some new friends along the way.

I hope to build a future that I can proudly start living in now.

Fighting an uphill battle against indoor allergens and dry air. Would keeping my HVAC fan on all the time be a good way to address both of these issues? Apologies if this is too off-topic.

Edit: Thanks for all the helpful responses. I'm boiling water and have ordered some evaporative humidifiers. Some nice HEPA purifiers are going in next month's budget.